Comments

The Badwater 135-mile Ultramarathon was held last week, starting in Death Valley and going all the way to Mount Whitney (though not to the very top). The people who compete in this race are insane. You have to have completed a 100-mile race just to be considered for the ultramarathon, and they turn away tons of people.

Here's the recap from this year's race. The fastest men's time of 22 hours and 51 minutes comes out to running 135 ten-minute miles. I can't imagine you'd be up for a pizza party after running for 24 straight hours. ben

Comments

In the "Local News" section of CNN's website, I usually get my weather forecast and an array of dull news about area power outages (my power was out for 5 hours yesterday), city council meetings, or high school events.

Comments

These are dark days for professional sports. First, there's Tim Donaghy, the NBA ref who is accused of gambling on games in which he was the referee. These federal probes are almost never handed down unless the person is 99% guilty, and all the evidence seems to suggest that this guy is a total jerk and mixed up with the mob, among other things. Unless he goes into witness protection soon and names names, I don't like his chances of survival, let alone staying out of prison. Here's a link to Deadspin's live-blog of David Stern's press conference today.

Then we have Mike Vick, who will never play professional football again thanks to the dogfighting charges. Similar to Donaghy, he could try to plea-bargain his way out, but I don't think it will matter enough for the league to accept him back. Others agree. Sorry, Falcons fans, you're looking at Joey Harrington as your starting QB come September.

Next there's Barry Bonds, who will break Hank Aaron's record later this week. It seems like a lot of people are resigned to accept the record as legit and let bygones be bygones. At the same time, lots of people, myself included, are trying to ignore it and pretend it's not happening. I'm sure that Barry's ex-mistress's upcoming playboy interview and pictorial will rile up a lot of people again.

Now we find out pre-race favorite Alexandre Vinokourov failed a blood-doping test, and his team pulled out of the Tour de France. With all the rampant drug use there, the Tour has become not worth watching. You don't know if half the riders you're watching are going to be kicked out the next day.

Gary Player even claimed last week that there was steroid use in golf!

What's left? Hockey, tennis, and competitive eating, I suppose. I guess I picked the right month to stop watching ESPN...and the wrong week to stop sniffing glue. I couldn't take any more of their "Who's Now" bullcrap. I'm doing my best to get my sports news elsewhere (Deadspin, CNNSI), and I've been watching the Today show in the morning, just like I used to before I had cable. The only thing that's the same is Al Roker. That guy is like a rock, only with folds of excess skin. ben

Comments

With the movie coming out on Friday, everyone seems to be remembering that the Simpsons used to be funny. I'm not sure why they ever forgot, as you can watch two or three episodes a day in syndication. But either way, the hype machine revs up for the film version that's 14 years too late.

Comments

The NYT has an article on the eternal debate: to throw it back or not to throw it back? Fans at Wrigley always throw back home run balls hit by opposing players, but the guys on the streets behind the stadium (Waveland, Sheffield), referenced here as "ballhawks," keep them as souvenirs or try to sell them.

Me? If I were in the bleachers and caught number 756, I'd throw it back. Seriously. I've never caught a home run ball out there, but I'd do it without a second thought. No fake ball in the pocket to throw back, either. My identity as a Cubs fan is more valuable to me than the money I'd make from selling it. ben

Comments

William:
Wait till you have a mortgage. Then you might rethink things.7/18/2007

Luke S.:
You should probably keep the ball and sell it. That way you'll at least get something out of being a Cubs fan.7/18/2007

Luke S.:
I apologize for that last comment. It was made out of jealousy.7/20/2007

ben:
i'm confused, are you jealous of me catching the home run ball?7/24/2007

Brazil's baseball team features 16 of 20 players with Japanese ancestry, and the team also used Japanese baseball terms. Turns out Brazil is the country with the largest population of Japanese descendants. Who knew?

Comments

Comments

these aren't new, but they were sitting in my RSS feed for a while and I finally got around to watching them:

1. Stephon Marbury in a truly inexplicable interview. Be sure to watch all 9 minutes. It goes from him not knowing what a "dime" is (it's an assist, he's a "point guard"), having his cell phone ring and checking his phone, talking about kissing his sister, and ends with him saying "I want to see the spit in your mouth." I have no idea what that means, but it's the perfect ending.

Comments

is to not take advice from tv shows. One of my favorite Homer Simpson quotes:

Getting out of jury duty is easy. The trick is to say you're prejudiced against all races.

We'll, that's exactly what this guy tried in a Massachusetts court, and it landed him in jail for the night, facing perjury charges. How are they going to prove he's not a racist homophobic habitual liar? ben

Comments

That's right, 40% of independents favor impeachment of Bush. In fact, more people support impeaching Bush now than were in favor of impeaching Clinton while Clinton was being impeached!

For your weekend reading, try the Times editorial from today saying we should get out of Iraq, Frank Rich's NYT column on Bush's cowardice (Times Select, but I found it for free here), and Keith Olbermann's special comment on the Libby commutation. ben

Comments

I missed 5...I won't say who, but I'm not happy I missed them. Although they're some of the most frequently missed so I don't feel so bad. Try it here. My only hint is that you will do well to remember the Simpsons' episode with the Presidents' Day Pageant, especially the song "The Mediocre Presidents." ben

Comments

The always excellent Virginia Heffernan has a piece in today's NYT that uses "Hey Paula," the show chronicling Paula Abdul's tough, tough life, to talk more broadly about the "celebreality" genre of shows. My one disappointment in the piece: she didn't talk about Lisa Kudrow's excellent, short-lived HBO show, "The Comeback," which was a perfect satire of exactly this type of entertainment. Or, rather, "entertainment."

Comments

Most of you probably won't give a crap, but here's a story about the guys who string the rackets of the best tennis players in the world. I'm a sucker for the "guy behind the guy" stories, as well as anything about tennis, so this is a perfect fit. ben